


Safe Again

by Koneko713



Category: The Hobbit - All Media Types
Genre: M/M, Non-Graphic Violence, Sibling Incest, unabashed fluff
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-03-23
Updated: 2013-03-23
Packaged: 2017-12-06 06:04:14
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,087
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/732269
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Koneko713/pseuds/Koneko713
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The Company is overtaken by goblins on the way to Rivendell, and Kili and Bilbo find themselves separated from the group, injured, and alone.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Safe Again

**Author's Note:**

> Prompt from a friend: "Bilbo or Kili gets separated from the company and has to find his way back." I ended up having them both get lost. And it somehow became Durincest because this pairing is like glitter: it taints everything I write. Not that I fight against it all that much...  
> This is somewhere between movie and book canon; there's several days between the encounter with the trolls and getting to Rivendell, and they still have the ponies. However, they do have orcs chasing them like in the movie. If that makes sense.  
> Also, I HATE summaries and titles.

It was two days after they encountered the trolls, when the company was a few days out from Rivendell, that the orcs struck.  They had no warning; no howling or screeching preceded the attack.  One minute they were riding along comfortably enough, the next Nori was crying out and hunching over, the dark feathers of an orc arrow protruding from his thigh. 

Then the sounds started.  The shrieking yells of the goblins erupted behind them, accompanied by the howling of wargs, and it didn’t take Gandalf’s shout of “Ride!” to have every one of them pounding down the road at a dead gallop.

Kili had been at the back of the group with his brother and the halfling, as usual.  When the shouts went up and all fifteen of them kicked their ponies into a sprint, Fili immediately guided his mount to Bilbo’s side.  The halfling bounced heavily on his pony’s back, clearly only a moment from slipping off.  The blond grasped his arm just in time, hauling him back into a straighter seat.

That left Kili alone at the very back of the group, with wargs pouring out of the brush on either side and giving chase.  He groped for his bow on his back, trying to lean lower in the saddle to avoid the arrows that were whistling around his head.  It didn’t take long before they stopped, and he took a quick glance over his shoulder.  The dust raised by the ponies’ hooves nearly obscured his vision, but he could hear the growling pants of the wargs coming closer.

No dwarf-pony was bred to outrun wargs, and the pursuers quickly caught up.  Kili released his one-handed grip on the reins, clenching hard with his legs to keep from falling as he yanked an arrow from his quiver.  Turning in the saddle, he only took a moment to aim, and let fly.

The bouncing of the pony’s gait threw his aim off, and instead of hitting the warg he was aiming for an orc clutched at its chest and fell.  Always good, but the creature’s mount was still bearing down on him with its very large teeth bared.  Kili nocked another arrow, spilling two more from his quiver in his haste, and shot down the warg as it lunged at his pony’s haunches. 

The dust was flying up into his eyes, and he blinked away blurring tears as he tried to aim at another enemy.  He’d just sighted one when his pony shied sideways, dashing around a sharp bend after the group, and Kili’s rather unsure grip with his legs loosened.  He managed to stifle his cry as he tumbled off, curling instinctively around his bow to protect it from damage.

Through sheer luck he fell right off the dusty road, into a thick clump of brush and nettles.  He froze, ignoring the stinging pain and the deep ache where his shoulder and hip had impacted the ground.  The snarling of the wolves and gabbling war cries of the goblins drew level—and passed him by.

He didn’t move for long minutes afterwards, waiting until he could no longer hear the sound of the chase.  Then he cautiously sat up, peering out of the tangled undergrowth.  There was no sign of the orcs.  More importantly, there was no sign of the Company, aside from a few of his own arrows scattered on the road.  Peering up and down the road revealed nothing but trees and undergrowth, waving slightly in the breeze.

Kili took a deep breath, opened his mouth to shout—and closed it again with a snap.  While his brother was looking for him, no doubt, the orcs may be as well.

_His brother._

He took another deep breath, this one to steady himself.  He didn’t know if Fili was alright, if he and the others had made it to safety…

The impulsive side of him wanted to take off at a dead sprint down the road after the group, but he squashed that urge.  They had ponies and he was on foot; he’d never catch up.  He crawled back into the brush to retrieve his bow, relieved to see that both it and the string were still intact.  His arrows had scattered from his quiver when he fell, and he gathered as many as he could, including the broken ones.  He could find something to use them for, no doubt.

Most of his things were still on the pony, which was presumably still with the others.  He had his bow, quiver and short sword, so he could defend himself against just about anything that came at him, as long as he wasn’t too badly outnumbered.

He took a moment to steel himself for the long walk ahead, and set off down the road toward the mountains.

***

Kili hadn’t been walking long when he froze, drawing an arrow from his quiver and nocking it, swivelling towards the noise he’d heard.  It came again.  A small, animal whimpering from the undergrowth on his left had him raising the weapon defensively, but the sound was slightly familiar.  He crept closer to it, cautiously using the tip of the arrow to push aside the brambles obscuring his view.

There, crumpled on the forest floor in front of him, was the Company’s hobbit.  He was curled into a tight ball, shaking so hard his teeth were audibly chattering, but other than that the only sounds that escaped him were those tiny whimpers that had alerted Kili to his presence.

“Bilbo!” the dwarf hissed, sprinting forward and skidding to his knees beside the hobbit.  “What happened?  I thought Fili had you.  How did—“

Bilbo rolled over with a long, low whine through clenched teeth, and Kili bit his lip to hold in a small grunt of horror.  Bilbo’s arm was clearly broken, the forearm bent unnaturally in the middle, and the area around the break was already turning dark and swollen.  Luckily the broken bones hadn’t pushed through the skin.

Bilbo appeared nauseated, carefully avoiding looking at the arm that was cradled close to his chest.  “I fell.  Fili realized he couldn’t hold me on so he shoved me hard enough to get me off the path, where the orcs wouldn’t see me.”

Kili hissed through his teeth as he inspected the arm, seeing with relief that the break wasn’t as bad as it could be.  The bones were still fairly close to the right place.  Of course, he was no healer, and he didn’t dare to try setting them.  He might do more permanent damage.  Bilbo was watching him with eyes wide in his pale face, looking terrified.

“I’ll need to splint this so you can move,” Kili told him, inspecting their surroundings and eventually kneeling by the hobbit’s bad side.  “Here, rest your arm on my knees.  We need to keep it higher than your chest, and I’ll get it bound.”

Bilbo started to lift his arm, but then his head lolled and his eyes rolled back in his pale face.  “No no no, stay with me, halfling,” Kili said sharply, reaching out to grasp the forearm gingerly above and below the break, careful not to shift the bones as he pulled it into his lap.  He drew a couple of snapped arrows from his quiver, congratulating himself mentally for having the foresight to save them, and bound two of them tightly on either side of the arm with a strip cut from the hem of his tunic.

Bilbo bit his lip until it bled down his chin, but didn’t utter a single sound.  Kili smiled down at him as he worked, babbling to distract him.  “You know, me and Fili both did this to ourselves a lot when we were younger.  He got better stories than me though.  He only ever broke bones during weapons training.  I did just this to my arm falling out of a tree, once.”

That got a small, strained smile from the hobbit.  “That sounds like you two,” he muttered.  “I’m guessing Fili was the one who had to patch you up that time, and that’s where you learned it.”

Kili’s smile flickered, though his hands remained steady.  Talking about his brother hurt, and made all his fears that they would never find the group (and Fili) come to the surface.  When the hobbit looked up at him searchingly he made sure to look reassuring.

“There.  Now that it’s splinted it should hurt less.  You ought to be able to get up and walk around.”  Kili hesitated a moment before he moved to push Bilbo into a sitting position.  He knew they should keep the break higher than his heart, to keep the swelling down, but he could hardly ask the hobbit to wander about holding his painfully broken arm over his head.  And they needed to move; they were just as likely to be found by orcs as they were by the Company.

Bilbo stood carefully, turning delicately green as he jostled the injury.  “Do you think you can walk a ways before we stop?”  Kili asked, hovering at his good side in case the hobbit collapsed.  Bilbo set his jaw, nodded firmly, and set off down the road without looking to see if the dwarf was following.  Kili sighed, trotting after him.  Was this how Fili felt all the time?

***

As he expected, pure determination couldn’t get the hobbit that far before Bilbo dropped onto a fallen tree beside the road and folded over his splinted arm, sweating profusely.  Kili wasn’t sure what to do to help, though he hated seeing the halfling looking so pained. 

He bit his lip, looking at the slowly darkening sky and back at Bilbo, who hadn’t moved.  “C’mon.  We’ll get off the road a bit, and I’ll find something for us to eat.  I don’t think they’re going to find us tonight.”

Bilbo groaned, low and miserable, and Kili sat down on the log beside him, gingerly slinging an arm around his shoulders.  “They will find us, Bilbo.  Thorin likes you, especially since you saved us from getting eaten by those trolls.  Sorry about that, by the way.”

That got a smile from their burglar, and he parted the fingers of his good hand to scowl at the dwarf.  “You should be.”

Kili laughed, lifting Bilbo to his feet and giving him a gentle nudge off the road.  “Let’s go, Mr Boggins.  Time to find a place to camp.”

Not far off they found a large oak tree with fairly low branches, and Bilbo halted, considering.  “Kili, if orcs are out here, maybe it would be safer to sleep in a tree?”

Kili frowned.  “But with your arm—“

“You can lift me, can’t you?  I’d rather be hauled around like baggage than become warg food.”

Kili couldn’t argue with that, though he insisted they should stay on the ground for as long as possible first while he hunted for dinner.  He found a rabbit, and soon had it roasting over a small smokeless fire.  Bilbo huddled on the other side of the flames, looking much less discouraged than Kili would have expected.

“One would think you got lost in the wilds all the time, halfling,” he teased, turning the rabbit so it wouldn’t char.

Bilbo shrugged his good shoulder.  “You know what you’re doing, even though I don’t,” he replied, eyes fixed on the flames.  “And we won’t be out here alone for long.  I’m sure your brother will search all night if he has to.”

Kili stared at the hobbit for a moment, before ducking his head to hide his watering eyes.  _Fili_.  It had been years since they’d spent a night apart.  Had he been alone he would have been desperate to find the others, and would have walked all night to get back to his brother.  He was sure Fili was equally frantic, but he also knew his brother had more sense than to turn around and gallop back, once they shook the wargs.  It wouldn’t be good for the pony, that was certain.  He didn’t doubt that Fili would turn around to find him tomorrow, though, alone if necessary.  But that left him with a full night to survive alone.

_Not quite alone,_ he reminded himself, swallowing to get his tears under control.  _I’m just the one_ doing _the looking-after instead of_ needing _it._

When he looked up, Bilbo was watching him curiously.  “You two are close,” he commented.

Kili shrugged.  “We always have been.  The only time we’ve been separated was when Fili came of age, and Thorin took him along on his next trip.  Said Fili needed to learn the duties of the heir, but I was too young.  It only took a few months before he came to fetch me, though.  Turns out our mother kept writing to him, complaining that I was completely useless without my brother, and Thorin was having the same problem with Fili.  So my training started a few years early.”

He didn’t tell Bilbo about the reunion that had followed Thorin’s return.  That he had been practicing when they returned, and Fili had barely paused to greet their mother before running off to find him.  He didn’t talk about how surprised he’d been when Fili caught him mid-turn, colliding with him at full speed and sending both of them tumbling.  He most certainly didn’t mention the shock of Fili’s lips meeting his own, then the relief of tangling hands in thick blond hair and yanking because no matter how close they got it _wasn’t close enough._

He startled when juice from their dinner dropped hissing into the fire, and saw that Bilbo was looking at him curiously.  He realized he was smiling stupidly, and forced his expression into something more suitable for the situation.  “I’m sure the others will find us tomorrow,” he said confidently, reaching out to turn the rabbit again.

After eating Kili put out their fire and buried the ashes under dry leaves, doing his best to erase all trace of them on the ground.  He found his way back to the road, found a suitable tree, and carved a K rune into it, making certain that the light wood showed through the dark bark.  He did the same to several trees leading back to their camp.  It would give the orcs a clue, but hopefully they would lose the trail and not think to check in the branches.

Getting Bilbo up the tree was a long and painful process, but they managed to get him settled fairly securely on a wide limb about three times his own height off the ground.  The hobbit leaned back against the trunk and almost immediately dropped off to sleep, so exhausted by the day’s events that even the pain couldn’t keep him awake.

Kili wedged himself into the fork of a branch a little above Bilbo, setting his bow across his knees, intending to stay awake and keep watch for the rest of the night.  However, it didn’t take long before his eyelids too were drooping, and he was asleep before an hour passed.

***

Kili woke with a start to a noise at the foot of their tree.  He opened his mouth automatically to call for his brother, and immediately a hand slapped over it.  Bilbo was shaking with the effort and pain as he held himself balanced with minimal help from his bad arm, holding his other palm over Kili’s face.  It took only a split second for Kili’s brain to catch up, and he tried to shake off Bilbo’s hand.  He was unsuccessful until he finally stuck out his tongue, forcing the fingers away from his mouth, and looked down at the forest floor below them.

_Something_ was creeping around the clearing at the base of the tree.  He couldn’t see much in the weak starlight, but he was fairly sure it wasn’t a dwarf.  Dwarves didn’t move with that odd shuffling-skipping gait.  It swung over to the edge of the clearing, and he caught sight of the clear gleam of a knife at its belt.

Bilbo’s eyes were wide in the dim light, and even after the goblin left, neither of them slept for the rest of the night.

***

The next day was horrifying.  They made it down from their tree in one piece and set off again.  By noon Bilbo was staggering, and in spite of his insistence that he was fine, Kili forced him to sit down.  They hadn’t had anything to drink since the day before, because the water skins had all been in saddlebags.  Kili was terrified, almost certain that the hobbit was dangerously close to passing out from shock.

Bilbo complained when they left the road, but couldn’t summon up enough energy to protest too vehemently.  Kili checked his arm, grimacing at the swollen, bruised flesh.  The bones didn’t seem to be setting crooked, which was good.  Kili’d heard about times when healers had to re-break a badly set bone to straighten it.

Kili paced back and forth, torn.  They needed to find water for the hobbit, that was certain.  They couldn’t be that far from the ford of the Loudwater, but Bilbo might not make it that far.  He didn’t have anything to use to carry water back.  Finally he gave up, hauling the hobbit to his feet and slipping an arm around his waist to support him as they continued down the road.

Bilbo insisted he could walk on his own, which Kili ignored.  He just hoped he wasn’t going to end up carrying the halfling before the day was over.

They reached the Ford around midafternoon, and Kili was happy to see only hoof-prints in the soft mud of the bank.  There was no trace of the paws of wargs.  They both drank as much as they could, and it was jointly decided that they would spend the night on the bank of the river.

Kili didn’t quite trust that the orcs wouldn’t find them, even here.  Just because they hadn’t crossed the river _yet_ didn’t mean they _wouldn’t_.  They found another climbing tree, and Kili started a large fire.  He insisted that they needed to clean their myriad of scrapes and cuts from their respective falls, though there wasn’t much he could do to further the healing of Bilbo’s arm.  He had enough time before dark to hunt up two rabbits, this time, and Bilbo located some kind of herb he said would improve the flavour.  Kili had no idea what it was, not being a picky eater or a particularly good cook, and took Bilbo’s word for it.

After they had eaten a much more satisfactory meal that the night before Kili took one of the rabbit hides, filled it with water, and boiled the liquid using stones heated in the fire.  Bilbo was swaying where he sat, apparently only partially revived by the drink, and when Kili used a rag to clean the various scrapes on the hobbit’s upper arm and side he noticed that the skin beneath his fingers felt uncomfortably warm.

“Bilbo, you have a fever,” he said blankly.  He had no idea what to do with this development.  He knew how to treat broken bones in theory, but had never actually had to do it before, and he obviously had no idea what this kind of trauma might do to the body of a hobbit.  After all, they were clearly less sturdy than dwarves.

Bilbo nodded, teeth chattering slightly with chills.  “I think it’s fairly normal.  I just need some rest, but that won’t happen until we find the others.”

Kili had to accept that, but he still did his best to find a comfortable enough limb for the hobbit to sleep on, and situate him on it without too much painful jostling of his arm.  As he meandered around under the tree, kicking leaves over the ashes of the fire and burying the entrails and hides of the rabbits, he could feel himself starting to shake. 

When he’d volunteered to go on this adventure he had pictured gold and glory and occasional skirmishes with goblins that shrieked and ran away after one or two of them were slaughtered.  Wargs and broken hobbit bones and losing Fili had never been part of it.  He stopped, scrubbing the back of his hand over his eyes, making sure all trace of wetness was gone before he climbed the tree to sit beside the hobbit.

He’d thought Bilbo was asleep, and startled when he felt a gentle hand on his knee.  He looked up at the hobbit, confused, to be met with a gentle smile.  “Thank you for looking after me.” Bilbo murmured, already slipping into sleep.  Kili felt warm pride welling in his chest, and he knew he was grinning like a fool as he drifted off as well.

***

The next day Kili was awakened just before sunrise by the sounds of movement at the base of the tree.  He leaned out to look down, grabbing his bow just in case—and almost yelped in surprise and happiness.

There was a familiar figure crouched below their hiding place, currently brushing the leaves away from the remains of their fire and running his fingers through the still damp ashes.  Kili couldn’t make out much in the early dawn light, but there was no mistaking the gleam of the silver clasp in golden hair, or the identity of the second figure that lurked at the edge of the clearing, clearly anxious to be gone.

The sound of his boots slipping on the tree bark made Fili look up just as Kili landed on him.  The elder dwarf let out a shout of joy, arms wrapping around his brother as he let Kili’s weight carry them both to the ground.  Thorin whirled around, already drawing the long elf-blade he’d found in the troll-hole, before he was beaming at the pair clutching to each other on the ground, both trying to talk at once.  Kili pulled away from his brother just long enough to call “you should get Bilbo down.  He can’t climb on his own.”

Immediately Thorin was swarming up the tree, followed closely by Bofur.  The rest of the company was converging on the small clearing, most of them watching as the hobbit was carefully lifted down.  Kili sighed with relief as Oin took charge of Bilbo, dropping his head down to rest on Fili’s shoulder.

“This feels familiar,” Fili breathed in his ear, and Kili chuckled at the realization that with all the commotion going on around them they were still sprawled in a tangle on the forest floor.  He rested his forehead against Fili’s, matching breaths with his brother, before impulsively leaning in.  He hesitated, to see if Fili would stop him, and was met with Fili’s mouth hard and insistent on his.  Both of them smirked into the kiss at the sound of a couple of gasps from the Company, a sigh that sounded like it came from Thorin, and a whistle that—at a guess—Kili would say was Dwalin.

It took quite a while before the pair was willing to stop kissing, and longer before they would let go of each other.  Finally Oin threatened Fili with serious bodily harm if he wasn’t allowed to look Kili over, and the brunet fidgeted and squirmed until the healer pronounced him fit.  Fili had been called away by Thorin, and Kili was surprised to find Bilbo at his side, looking a bit green with pain, but his arm was set and bound tightly in a sling.

“When you said you and your brother had always been close that wasn’t exactly what I thought you meant,” the hobbit commented dryly, watching the swordsman debating with Thorin and Dwalin.  “And I think I understand better why you were so desperate to get back to him, now.”

Kili opened his mouth, realized he didn’t know what to say, and shut it again.  “Yes, I noticed how upset you were,” Bilbo continued.  “It was…well, it was odd, how much you changed without Fili there with you.  Less smiles and laughter and all seriousness.  I think I like you two together, more.”

Kili smiled, and his grin grew wider as Fili caught his eye over their uncle’s shoulder and rolled his eyes.  “I think I like the two of us together more, too.”  The archer said softly, relaxing for the first time in days.

Finally, he was safe again.

**Author's Note:**

> I'm trying to work through writers block which is plaguing my in-progress fic. Written quickly and sloppily (and I'm still stuck on Of Heart and Soul dammit).


End file.
